Here, the word frog is usually used after the F word. Again, I suggest that you not use it in front of any of my family. Usuages change over the years, and I do not want to discuss the origin of the word, I was making a point about something that may not be in your realm of experience.

There resides, at the local university, documents relating to my families post office, located at the end of the underground railroad. The main letter is written by a boy of 14 who told his cousin that they have the best postman his dad ever met working for them, and he has a nice bike and he is a N (word), and everyone loves this man, he is kind, gentle, and always smiling. Along with the letter are the daily notes from the family sawmill, dated 1850 or so, and it great fun to see how the mill made 500 board feet of oak plank for this church or that store, or for the construction of an office. The family had the sawmill, but then moved it on a train in 1897 to New Liskeard, due to the lack of good trees in the area north of Chatham. The assumption, of my son who is finishing his Phd in anthro this year, is that the N word was not considered derogatory in Canada in the early 1800s, but we would never use it now.....

There is also a description of using dynamite to split oak logs that were way to big to run through the saws. That to me is a great image...

Education is an on going process. I know little about the word Yanks. We are working on a tune ...Heres your Mule Gallop...in one of my bands and it says NC Regiment on it and seems to be dated to the Civil War era.....Dr. Hank the director says it was one of the most played numbers if Civil War recreation bands that he has lead over the last 30 years.....but was it a Northern Tune or Southern tune.

Like the Irish side of my family, they sing A Cushla Mine for Danny Boy, the Danny Boy thing was considered Catholic, like the wife. The priest would not let us marry in the church so we had a party at a nice hotel and did the deed there.

John Conley
Musica est vita